The subject matter herein relates generally to electrical connectors that have ground tie bars that electrically common ground conductors.
High speed electrical connectors typically transmit and receive high speed data signals over pairs of conductors, referred to as differential pairs. Adjacent differential pairs of signal conductors are separated by ground conductors to reduce electrical interference, such as cross-talk, between the adjacent pairs. But, while the ground conductors do isolate the signal pairs, the lengths of the ground conductors along the electrical connector between a mating end and a terminating end lead to resonances or resonance noise. The resonance noise is caused by standing electromagnetic waves that propagate along the ground conductors, varying the electrical potential of the ground conductors along the lengths. The resonance noise can interfere with the pairs of signal conductors to degrade the signal transmission performance. Both the resonance noise and cross-talk increase as the electrical connectors convey more data at faster data transfer rates and higher frequencies. Some high speed electrical connectors include ground tie bars that electrically connect the ground conductors to common the ground conductors together. The commoning of the ground conductors serves to reduce the resonance noise within the connector.
Electrical connectors with typical ground tie bars are not without disadvantages. For example, the ground conductors that are electrically commoned via the ground tie bar can only be used as ground conductors. But, some electrical connector systems convey signals other than high speed differential signals, such as power, low speed data signals, and the like, which may be conveyed using a single-ended conductor instead of a pair of two conductors. Single-ended conductors do not require shielding by ground conductors. In known electrical connectors, the ground conductors that are tied together are not reconfigurable as signal conductors because ground conductors that are electrically commoned cannot convey distinct signals. An exemplary high speed electrical connector known in the art may include a single ground conductor disposed between pairs of signal conductors along a length of a conductor array. In order to provide three single-ended conductors in a row, such as to provide power, receive low speed sensing data, and transmit low speed output data, two adjacent pairs of signal conductors are required to provide the three single-ended signal conductors. The ground conductor disposed between the two pairs of signal conductors is unused since single-ended conductors do not require shielding by ground conductors. The fourth signal conductor in the two pairs of signal conductors is also unused since only three single-ended conductors are required. Thus, in this example, two conductors are merely taking up valuable space in the electrical connector, which may be costly in light of the ongoing trend towards smaller, faster, and higher performance electrical connector systems.
A need remains for an electrical connector that can configure at least some electrical conductors as ground conductors that are electrically commoned together or as signal conductors for transmitting data in order to increase contact density and operability of the electrical connector.